Volunteers provide great value to Mesa Fire Dept

Tracy Becker wades past dozens of Hannah Montana dolls, a Mr. Potato Head and tons of teddy bears.

East Mesa fire station to be accelerated

She and Adriana Clesceri then load up their Mesa Fire Department truck and head to deliver the toys on a recent weekday to a family near Stapley Drive and Broadway Road. It's part of a program to help struggling parents brighten up a day in their kids' lives.

For Becker and Clesceri, both volunteers in the Mesa Fire Department, playing Santa was quite a break from their usual duties.

Usual could be anything from helping stranded motorists after an accident, or following up with a family whose house has just been burned down. They average up to 10 calls a day.

"It's so gratifying to be able to help someone when they need it the most," said Clesceri, one of the newest among nearly 100 volunteers in the department's 10-year-old connector program, aimed at helping take up administrative and basic non-emergency tasks that free up trained fire crews and their big engines.

With the fire department facing a $7.5 million shortfall over the next 18 months, these volunteers are helping the city monetarily, too. Last year, they saved $400,000, with more than 20,000 hours of service.

"Those savings can really add up," Mesa Fire Chief Harry Beck said recently, as he presented a painful budget scenario to the City Council.

As the department looks at ways to reserve the firefighters for fires, heart attacks and drownings, among other emergencies, where they're needed the most, Beck is underscoring the need to expand the use of volunteers.

"It's still such a work in progress," Mesa fire spokesman Mike Dunn said. "We want to make better use of our volunteer programs, but we aren't sure how they will ultimately look."

Beck is exploring ways to bolster the kinds of lower-level emergency calls that volunteers can handle without firefighters, like a chirping smoke detector or a minor flooding. Exactly how the volunteers' roles will be reallocated is still being crafted.

One step being taken is to better train dispatchers to interpret phone calls so that they know which unit to send to a 911 call, depending on the level of emergency.

Already these volunteers fill a vital role in emergency response.

As she drove her truck, Clesceri recalled the time a family needed help after an electrical part in their fish tank caught fire, damaging their house. She took all the information and checked on the victims, to make sure they had their basic needs met for the night, like shelter and clothing.

Clesceri says the best part about being a volunteer is to be able to help people. On calls with firefighters, she and Becker have helped stranded motorists, checked batteries and jump-started cars.

"They have been described as knights in shining armor or God-sent angels," said Warren Sprecher, who coordinates the program.

Becker said some calls, especially when they involve the elderly, can be heartbreaking, and need time to deal with. It isn't something that's possible for the firefighters to take on.

Meanwhile, Anita Mapes, a social-service worker and volunteer coordinator with the department, checks in on a family of three elderly women, two of whom had fallen in their home and called 911 in November. She gently tells them how the octogenarian sister can't possibly keep up her role as a caretaker for their 94-year-old mother and her younger sibling.

Currently these calls are not tracked as part of the Mesa's fire crew calls, but Beck said he would like to see that, because they're increasing, as the city's demographics tend to support an elderly population.

Volunteer retention is a concern for Sprecher.

Typically the average time a volunteer stays is 18 months. About 25 percent of the 600 volunteers they have trained go on to become firefighters. The economy hasn't helped, because fewer people have the time to take on volunteering, as they need to get a second job to make ends meet.

"At this point, I don't think there's a magic bullet out there," Sprecher said.

His volunteers do three five-hour shifts on weekdays and two 7.5-hour shifts weekends.

Beck has suggested to the City Council using the talent of retired school teachers to work with the department, for instance.

"It's an arena we need to explore; an untapped resource," Beck said.